Amazon’s Music Store Beats Apple’s

Six months after it launched, Amazon's music store has become my favorite. It's easy to navigate, usually has what I'm looking for, and is beautifully consistent in selling songs without copy restrictions.

I worried that the buying process would be more cumbersome than at Apple's iTunes store. I use iTunes as my primary music program, and the iTunes store works seamlessly with the software.

But Amazon has crafted a nifty piece of software that downloads music from its store directly to iTunes. It works without a hitch.

Yes, it requires an extra click or two compared with buying from the iTunes store. But on occasion, I've bought a song or two from iTunes by accident that comes with copy protection. And like many consumers, I'd just as soon skip buying at all rather than have that "digital rights management" gum up the works.